Garçon stupide (2004) User Reviews

Very mixed success

[Chris Knipp · 7/10 · 17 November 2005]

Lionel Baier's "Garçon Stupide" is touching and sad -- and occasionally original -- without being wholly successful. It blends material from both Baier's and his non-actor star Pierre Chatigny's lives for the portrait of twenty-year-old Loic, a French-speaking Swiss gay guy who divides his time between an assembly-line job at a chocolate factory in the town of Bulle; graphically shown anonymous sex Loic finds via Internet; taking photos with his cellphone (which makes him dream of being a photographer); and chatting with his long-time pal Marie, a more mature woman at whose place he mostly sleeps. The split-screen sequences in which Loic's intense, bold sex scenes and the hammering factory machinery at his day job get paralleled are very obvious; but they do have the virtue of sharply veering away from the saccharine, super-sincere quality of so many gay coming-of-age films. This director doesn't look away from the mindless, self-destructive aspects of his main character. Unfortunately "Garçon Stupide" ultimately plays out too randomly to have an overriding viewpoint.

Loic becomes enraged at Marie one night. Her new relationship with a man has made him jealous. He calls her a slut, forgetting he's a super-slut himself. She kicks him out and says the relationship is over. This changes everything, since now he has no friend he can count on, or any friendly place to sleep.

The film, which is a rough but assured collage up to here held together by its vérité feel and the tall, striking (if blank-faced) Chatigny's strong physical presence, disintegrates into fantasy and sentimentality after the breakup with Marie. A narrative that had seemed real now begins to feel like thoughtless improvisation. Something happens to Marie. Loic wanders off and has a telegraphed car accident. He cashes in his savings to buy a professional quality video camera. In a pathetic, pointless digression, he pursues a minor football star from Portugal who plays on one of the local teams.

All this undercuts the simple specificity of the earlier sections and gives the film the appearance of having lost its way. Loic is naive, emotionally stunted, and ignorant: he tries to look things up in a dictionary but since the lacunae include such basics as Hitler and Impressionism, he has a long way to go to reach the middle-class/artistic life he dreams of. He is estranged from his family and without Marie has no one. The film, which avoids the conventional gay coming-of-age clichés, ends on a down note for two reasons -- because both Loic and his future are dim, and because director Baier lets his first film's promising opening crumble away into random pieces as it moves along. Loic ends with a long catalogue of things he is not going to become, but there's no sense of where he's going or what he will be.

beautiful film

[joelglevi · 7/10 · 17 May 2006]

I enjoyed this film. It has a lyrical quality, and it is essentially a character portrait. Many Americans will tire of the film quickly, because they expect clearer character development and a more coherent plot. But if these qualities ate not essential to you and you like French films, you will find this movie touching and memorable. (I know that this is a Swiss, not French, production, but I think most Americans will view it as stylistically French.) The main character and Chatagny's performance, reminded me greatly of Joseph Gordon-Levitt's character and performance in "Mysterious Skin." (Many Americans will prefer this movie, though the subject matter is darker.) I love both films, both performances. I hope to see more films with Pierre Chatagny.

The Embryo of a Fine Film Defuses

[gradyharp · 7/10 · 25 May 2006]

Though most reviewers and viewers are putting this film down as a waste of time, this particular viewer sees many redeeming factors here that, given some further time in the editing room and a bit of script doctoring, could have resulted in a moving story.

Young Swiss filmmaker Lionel Baier has both written (with Laurent Guido) and directed with quasi-autobiographical story that explores the coming of age of a lower class young lad who seems destined to settle for being a hustler. Loic (first time actor Pierre Chatagny) works in an assembly line chocolate factory in Bulle, Switzerland and his only 'life' is provided through his internet activity meeting men for sex. His casual sexual encounters (rather graphically shown in the first portion of the film) are his only answer to relating to people until he meets Marie (Natacha Koutchoumov) with whom he rooms and bonds. Marie is bright and encourages Loic, uneducated and uninformed, to look up words he encounters- a simple but well-intended manner in which Loic can improve himself. He meets the older Lionel (played by the director Lionel Baier) who dangles before Loic's eyes the possibilities of finer things in life. Loic spends his idle hours with a digital camera and between his new interest in photography and his pursuing his 'basic' education, he begins to long for a life more significant than his brainless casual sex. He becomes friends with a soccer player and his son, loses his friendship with Marie when Marie finds a real lover, and ultimately Loic yearns to escape the life of the 'stupid boy' of the title and enters a dreamworld fantasy of something better.

Good ideas for a film here, but Baier seems to get sidetracked into artsy camera work, quasi-porno, and surrealistic moving lights and alpine scenery, and the film falters as a result. But there does seem to be some promise of a new filmmaker on the rise, This film may not be tolerated by some for various reasons, but for the adventurous spirits who are unafraid of a bit of male frontal nudity and sexual acting out, here are redeeming aspects to this little film that merit attention. Grady Harp

Sensitive Look Inside a Soul

[jumpy5 · 7 October 2005]

This film took me into another country and into another world. It is a sensitive exploration of a young man trying to get his needs met the only ways he knows how. Luic, the young protagonist, is sorely lacking in his ability to cultivate the potential for relationships that appear in his life. The longing and hunger for emotional connection is powerfully expressed throughout the film. I wanted the young man to reach out to the other characters in the film, and the frustration I felt echoed that of Luic's. Obviously, he did not develop meaningful relationships in his childhood. And this has placed him inside a glass fortress of his own design. The filmmaker captures the human suffering associated with the conflict between our needful souls and our quest to live a life that speaks to those needs. I look forward to more films from this young director.

Fractured but poignant

[krisbolino · 7/10 · 14 April 2006]

This film is an interesting tour through the experiences of the main character, Loïc. The title of this movie is perfect--Loïc is definitely un garçon stupide. He has no emotional attachment, save Marie, his roommate/friend. He hooks up with other men online--of various ages and preferences--for meaningless sex. His mind is blank and simple. He does not know even what Impressionism is, or who Hitler was. He is detached from everything around him.

Lionel (who is also the director/writer/periodic cameraman) is a pivotal character in the change that Loïc undergoes. He explores new interests--most notably photography. He begins to learn that people can be interested in things other than sex. All the while, a turbulent undercurrent plays out for him. Marie has found someone. Though she does not spend an abundant amount of time with him, Loïc is thrown into a jealous rage. The two part ways, and Loïc becomes depressed.

Seeking companionship, Loïc becomes fascinated with Rui, a local footballer. He follows Rui, watches his games, and exhibits stalker-like behavior, including photographing him without his consent. Then the movie falls apart. Marie dies, though it is not entirely clear if she killed herself (in the scene where Loïc finds her, she is on the bathroom floor, bleeding; there is a rope tied around her neck and the exercise bar that Loïc installed has been torn from the doorway). Loïc then runs away and visits Rui, a process which is never fully explained--he is invited into Rui's house, introduced to his son, and the three go on a picnic.

It is then that a different Loïc is shown: one who is caring and compassionate. He cares for Rui, whose eyes were irritated by the sun. The scene then jumps to an overturned car driven by Loïc, and then to the hospital. A random man and his wife take care of Loïc until he is better. He then photographs a parade with socialists, communists, gay activists, and what appeared to be a fascist. The movie begins to end with him developing an identity, though it is not clear what that is. The final scene, and the only one in the last twenty-five or so minutes of the film that made a lot of sense to me is at a carnival. He wanders around, then gets on a ferris wheel. He is shown flirting with a guy in another seat, who looks back and smiles. The movie is an interesting exploration of Loïc's character, but the last few scenes are so fragmented that I'm left wondering what happened.

Intriguing boy betrayed by stupid moralising

[jaibo · 6/10 · 21 September 2008]

This film begins with an intriguing central character - a beautiful young Swiss gay man who lives with in a sexless relationship with a slightly older woman but divides his time between promiscuous sexual encounters with the (not always young or attractive) men he meets on the internet, and working a boring day job on a production line in a chocolate factory - and has an excellent sense of visual storytelling to hook you into his tale. Yet pretty soon, I realised that pretty Loic was being set up by the film maker as not merely a portrait of a working class gay boy making his chaotic way through contemporary consumer society, but as a moral lesson for the audience, in which they learn that (yawn) anonymous sexual encounters aren't the answer, it's bad to be selfish and celebrities (he's stalking a sexy, second-rate footballer) aren't what they're cracked up to be. As the title suggests, the film takes a moral angle on the "stupid boy" at its centre, and so the promise of being dropped into a genuine 21st century life without editorialising comes to nothing.

The film never really tackles why Loic gets so hung up by his own sexual waywardness and then projects his guilt onto others, as when he calls his girl friend a "slut" for sleeping with her boyfriend. There's something going on here about social pressures and normalising sexualities, but the film is so content on putting its hero through a pretty run-of-the-mill rites of passage story that it doesn't really take note of the class-ridden, banally consumerist world around him. A number of the plot devices - the accidental death of the girl friend, the "dream" meeting with the footballer in the Alps - are rather laboured, although worst of all is the unseen director surrogate (called, like the film's auteur, Lionel) who meets with Loic to question him and instruct him that "men can be interested in you without wanting to have sex with you." Which is pretty dishonest of Lionel, having sold the film as a portrait of a young kid who is pictured stripped on the publicity material and who he knows the target demographic will want to shag rotten.

In the final act, Loic spends all his money on an expensive digital camera, announces that he rejects all of the roles (insider or outsider) that society has to offer him, asserts that he will "tell my own stories" and promptly meets the boy of his dreams in a fairground. Frankly, this is sentimental, glib and philosophically naive. Loic will have to choose to inhabit at least some of the roles which he so stridently rejects, although I suppose that the voice over which announces all of this might be a satire on his naivety, but it isn't played that way.

Garçon stupide would have been better off not indulging in the jejune moralising which tries to make it a heard-it-all-before moral lesson rather than a truly impressionistic portrait; it betrays its lead character by ticking him off, rather than showing him deepening himself in an existential problem to which there is no glib solution, no matter that bourgeois gay filmmakers and their DVD collecting consumers might desire one.

Promising work by all but irritating to watch

[imyjr · 7/10 · 16 October 2005]

Whatever the merits of this film, and there are several, I find it most irritating that so much of it is filmed in close-up. It is like reading a text all in caps, with all sentences closed by an exclamation mark. At some point I got a headache. This is an relatively common fault with many indies regardless where they originate. Close-ups are used to highlight.... Use too much of it and it becomes tedious and levels the visual narrative.

Otherwise, there are promising signs. There is an amiability to the project that makes one feel churlish in criticizing it. Particularly moving is the scene between Loïc and the soccer player. The most perceptive lines in the whole film are given to the soccer player. Perhaps one ought to suspend disbelief, enjoy happy-ends, and wish Mr. Baier, his actors and crew, good luck with their next endeavor..... and of course, that they place greater trust in longer distances between lens and object.

Tedious, not touching

[Mark0099 · 3/10 · 28 May 2006]

I don't see what justifies the rave reviews. Apart from the exposition, it came off fairly boring. Yes, Loic is enigmatic and incredibly attractive, and the film could have developed well based on that, but instead it wanders hopelessly after its first 20 minutes and becomes essentially 90% talk and 10% plot. That gets old fast. Even the few unusual "incidents" toward the end -- which I'd guess are there to provide a shock or epiphany -- seem pointlessly surreal.

The director indulges a number of disconnected fetishes for no apparent purpose. What are we supposed to make of the recurring shots of the Alps, or the distressed and always-bandaged eyebrow piercing? If these are supposed to be symbolic of something about Loic, their meanings are far too obscure. If the writers intended to make us guess at these things, that's a tired, pretentious technique that I think ends up being merely annoying, not clever.

Baier has a genius

[jsmith1480 · 9/10 · 25 September 2005]

Director Lionel Baier has created a work of freshness and imagination and truth. The few melodramatic clichés he employs stand out only for their rarity. In choosing Pierre Chatagny to focus his camera upon, Baier has chosen brilliantly. (Baier who plays an older friend, Lionel, to Chatagny's Loic, is glimpsed just once. In truth the director is a young man of 28 with much great work ahead of him on the evidence of this production).

Though the character and, I would say, Mr. Chatagny at 20, is self-absorbed and vain as 20 year-old boys tend to be, his natural beauty reveals itself in every movement of his eyes and his isolation in the stark awkwardness of his stance. He is not hard to watch or gawk at for 90 minutes.

Loic,a horny Swiss youngster who has notched a lot of casual nocturnal sex, envies his sisterly girlfriend's enjoyable personal relations with her boyfriend, distrusts Lionel's apparent disinterest in immediate sexual gratification and feels hopeless in the presence of an adored soccer player's fatherly love for his three year-old son. Luoc is by turns angry and despairing and anxious.He has begun to suspect it doesn't always boil down to just sex but he doesn't know if he has anything more than sex to give or take and if there is a place in him where there is more he has no idea how to reach it. But after much pain and damage the first unexpected crack of sunlight in the wall of Luoc's frustration comes through beautiful and true. Jim Smith

A mixed review from me as well.

[jaybob · 7/10 · 2 July 2007]

The scenery & cinematography are excellent, The location is Lausanne Switzerland & surrounding area & is just beautiful.

The lead actor is a 20 year old HUNK,who thinks he is gay, He has affairs with men he meets on the Internet. He also has a boring job in a chocolate making factory.

He is also in a platonic relationship with a lovely young female museum worker.

These scenes are well written & acted & you would think you may be seeing a first rate film,There is even a discussion on a certain dangerous sex act, which is seldom mentioned in films & talked about this well. There are a few well handled male/male sex scenes.

All of a sudden there is a change of pace, (an auto accident involving our hero) all the scenes seem to slow down, It is to me, as if the director did not know what to do next & the last part of the film crawls.

The title is somewhat misleading as our hero is for from stupid, The acting is definitely first rate all the way

The movie is only 95 minutes long, the first 55 minutes are fine , then it starts to crawl to the ending.

Ratings **1/2 *(out of 4) 79 points* (out of 100) IMDb 7 (out of 10)

* This just misses being a *** film, but still a mild thumbs up.,

Who is afraid of feelings ?

[TranDucMinh · 4/10 · 10 June 2005]

What is wrong with homo flicks ? This one starts with a good idea and bogs down into utter confusion. The next step is complete oblivion.

A nice actor portrays a young and ignorant man from Gruyère who refuses to commit, refuses to envisage his relationship beyond raw sex cruised on the internet.

He lets a nice girlfriend escape him and tries to reinvent his life. Gradually he reflects on himself and thinks about cultivating his brain and shedding his quite meaningless existence (there does not seem to be much physical pleasure in it !). An interesting theme for a quite boring film.

A really great film.

[filmfan213 · 10/10 · 17 September 2005]

I saw this film in New York and was blown away by the acting ability of Pierre Chatagny. For somebody who has never acted before in a professional production, he certainly has a bright future ahead of him. While many films attempt the same docu-drama format that Garcon Stupide features, I have yet to see a film that succeeds at it as well as Garcon Stupide. From the beautiful shots of the Alps to the intense night scenes shot on the streets that Loic works, this film provides a stunning look at a young man arriving at one of the most crucial moments if his life. Loic constantly blurs the line between sex and love and leaves us wanting to know more about his turbulent life, if only to help him discover his true identity.

The Gamut of Emotions and Feelings From L to K

[Franco-LA · 3/10 · 15 November 2008]

Why L to K? Because that makes as much sense to me as the concept of this movie likely has for the director. This film suffers where many first time films fail (gay or straight) when a director chooses to film their own script. In this case, he also did the cinematography. The film is very impressionistic and also very slow. It takes some digressions, a few brief ones and one long one (the soccer player subplot), which in spite of some comments on here, really accomplishes nothing to advance the development of the main character that could not have been accomplished more logically, otherwise. The other flaw in this movie is the lack of logic. As an example, if Marie has goals and ambitions, in spite of whatever feelings she may or may not feel for Loic, why would she commit suicide, particularly if she had already sent him from her life. There is no rationale in some of the action in the film other than the director obviously did not know how to push the plot forward.

As a coming of age story, this is very weak. As a movie, the plot made little, if any sense. As a movie about the interior development of a character, of his realization of his place in society and the world, the movie suffers from an inconsequential lead with little to offer other than (at least apparently based on some reviews here and elsewhere) what some view as good looks. That is not enough to hang a life on, much less a 90 some minute film.

Youthful Portrait

[haridam0 · 23 April 2006]

The age of twenty is something of a milestone in life. The teens are gone forever, and the first phase of adulthood is begun.

Many youths manage this transition smoothly, while others find it more difficult. Loic, the antihero of "Garcon stupide," has a tough time.

During the course of this film, he supposedly sheds his sexual orientation, bounces from relationship to relationship and in the end, takes a stand on what roads he doesn't want to tread.

That he's confused is not atypical of twenty-year-olds. It's time to phase out sewing wild oats and begin settling down. Just where Loic wants to go seems unclear, and Writers Lionel Baier and Laurent Guido end on an inconclusive note.

By the same token, their entire lean narrative is in free form (often using spit screens) with time and events sometimes out of synch. There's no denying that Pierre Chatagny's naturalistic portrayal of the main character is clearly etched.

Opinions seem to vary regarding the effectiveness of this depiction, which is reminiscent of Sebastian Lifshitz's "Presque rien" (2002, with Stephane Rideau).

"Garcon stupide" was presented by Cinematheque --one of America's premiere film series, located in University Circle of Cleveland, Ohio. The audience at that showing was highly attentive and quite empathetic. (harry/76)

Waste of time

[danielw-49884 · 4/10 · 25 February 2020]

The drama plot is all over. Too many incomplete stories without end.

Very good film

[lcirigliano · 8/10 · 5 July 2005]

A very sexy, natural and stylish film about a "normal live" of a young men... compliments to to director and the actors! so complicated and funny is life today in modern Europe.

But it is not astounding that the most refreshing film with topic of homosexuality comes from Switzerland.

This country shows in deed an astoundingly positive tolerance an "bienveillance" in front of the gay &lesbian community, how was showed by the acceptance of homo-"marriage" by the peoples-referendum in spring 2005.

It is to hope, that such films can increase tolerance also in other countries, like USA, which are far more behind the development in Europe.

So: look this film a make an opinion. Tolerance is alway a virtue.

Apparently the main point of the movie is easily missed.

[imdb-jeroen · 8/10 · 7 January 2008]

Reading the other comments it seems everyone misses The Big Point in the movie: the meeting with Rui (the famous soccer-player) and the car accident serve as a catharsis for the main character Loic.

One could argue that the meeting with Rui never really takes place, but is just a dream Loic has when he's unconscious after the car accident... I'm not sure, and I think that's exactly what the director wants me to be...

Before the accident Loic has clearly lost his way, doesn't know how to give and receive love and fills that void with pointless sex. (Yes, some gay sex is quite bluntly shown, but to me that seems to have a very clear function) The split up with his platonic girl-friend/soul-mate Marie and quickly after that the unexpected death of her trigger a frenzy that ends in the car crash (or in meeting Rui and then the crash...)

After his accident Loic ends up at his parents place again, and seeing them we get to understand a little bit of his handicap in love. But he's changed, the (dream-?)meeting with Rui and the death of Marie finally made him 'grow up' and see things, life, in a more adult, a more loving way. He starts to see a future for himself, not clearly, but at least clear enough to know what he doesn't want. In the end he even seems to discover the possibility of falling in love,,,

a film as strange as its leading character

[TedGuthrie · 8/10 · 20 February 2006]

This film was fascinating but very confusing. Plot lines seemed to start and stop at random, generally without even a hint of resolution. Perhaps the director suffers from whatever disability Luic suffers... not quite Attention Deficit Disorder, but clearly an inability to stay with a particular story line. And Luic's inability to empathize or even appropriately connect with others suggests that there's some psychological or mental condition at work. It's not simple naiveté... even after he's experienced something, he's still essentially untouched and unenlightened by it. Luic is reminiscent of Chauncey Gardner from Being There -- a delightful chap who's a blank slate-- others project motives and insights onto his blankness, but those projections say more about them than about him... there's simply no 'there' with Luic, except his ability to capture them in photographs, whether on his phone or in his head... he examines them in microscopic detail, but with no more comprehension than he has of the stuffed animals in the museum. And is he drawn to the fellow at the end because he thinks he's seeing himself... or someone who has the same disability?

Mesmerizing Soundtrack, Emotionally Charged, Captivating

[christopher-208 · 9/10 · 20 October 2006]

Garcon Stupide (Stupid Boy) is an emotionally-packed punch. The film and it's lead character, Loic, had me hooked from the start. With the exception of a few slower scenes, I thoroughly enjoyed the film from start to finish. A few laughs, intense thought and emotion, and a few tears were generated from this well directed and acted film.

The filming techniques and styles, and the soundtrack selections helped me score this film. The direction and unique filming combined with some classical scores and the storyline all fit perfectly together.

The story itself follows the plight of Loic, a young handsome 20-year old who works in a chocolate factory by day, and entertains men of all ages by night for extra cash. In the film, he has a close loving friendship with a girl, Marie. He also develops a relationship of trust with a man he meets on the Internet, Lionel. The 2 never have sexual relations, just conversation about life. Something interesting to note: we never see Lionel. Or do we at the end? You decide.

The story line develops around Loic's desires to be someone - a photographer, a gay man, ...? He seems to have lost direction in life, and is unable to trust/confide in the 2 people who seem to care for him most, Marie and Lionel. When Marie finds a boyfriend, you can clearly see the upset and anger in Loic. He withdraws from Marie, and Lionel, and neither situation has a positive outcome.

In the meantime, he develops an infatuation of sorts with a local soccer player, who is successful, married and with child. Loic sees a life he wants for himself.

Although this is a French film (with English subtitles), we have young people like Loic all over America. And we have adults who take advantage of them - and we have adults, like Lionel in this film, who truly can be a trusted friend. One of my favorite lines spoken by Lionel to Loic is "You can be interested in someone without wanting to f**k them". This statement rings true for so many, both those near the age of 20, and those near the age of 40.

This is overall, an exceptional film - very good acting, great soundtrack, unique camera angles and film styles, wonderful story, and well-directed.

surprising, disturbing and real

[VikenMekhtarian · 10 September 2011]

I must admit the word "stupid" has been grabbing a lot of my attention recently. Wikipedia describes it as someone who initiates actions that they are aware will cause damage to themselves - my brief summary. It does not necessarily denote lack of intelligence - though it does beg the question a little - but rather, it focuses on the cognitive ability to understand the consequences clearly in light of destructive behaviour. Wiki does introduce Hanlon's Razor which states "Never attribute to malice that which is adequately explained by stupidity" I have been fascinated by this topic a lot since my study into the workings of the human brain and the various neurological disorder (or whatever u wanna call them) that effect people's personalities and lives.

This movie captivated me thoroughly. Not just because it draws a good portrayal of this young quasi-hustler gay man in the middle of France who is going through life aimlessly self-destructively, but also because it tells his story in such a subjective way which forces the audiences perception of him to verge on apathy and empathy. In some ways the this movies is a bit My Own Private Idaho and a bit Dancer in the Dark. I only wish it explored the psychological conditions he was suffering from a little more.

Wonderful directing and cinematography, the acting is superb given the difficulty of the characters.

Oh...and it's very similar to the movie The Stranger in US which I've reviewed earlier, though a much, much better exploration of gay mens' fascination with lost youth.